Asking For Change

Dear reader,

I think I have touched on the subject of 'change' in various articles but it seems that it is one of those issues that needs to be discussed from different angles, if we are to understand it as best we can. At the same time, I am pondering on the results of the recent elections with the rise of the far right in Europe.

We already know that life is constantly changing. We are constantly in progress and evolving. Every morning we wake up somehow different to who we were the night before, physically, psychologically and mentally. We are in a permanent state of change and data processing consciously or unconsciously. 

A big change occurs in two ways, internally or externally.
When something changes externally, we are called to redefine our relationship with that and take the same or a different position that will maintain our survival, safety and prosperity as we understand them every time. For example, if an earthquake happens and a man's house is destroyed, he will have to find another home to stay and continue his life. 
In external changes, seemingly external at least, we have no involvement in the fact that they happened as they were not caused by us.

Internal changes are probably a little different story. A person is called to listen to his inner, deep voice calling him to make a change from within. Some people find it easier to deal with changes and others find it it difficult.
Internal change, even if it concerns ones health, encompasses the choice as well as the responsibility of the person himself.
For example, if someone is diagnosed with an illness and a serious medical advice suggests to him to change dietary and other habits in order to improve his health, they have the choice not to follow it and continue to live as before, thereby taking the responsibility for any consequences. 

An internal change may often bring to the surface information from he past that we did not want to confront and incorporate in our lives. For example, the reasons why we had made specific choices in the past or how we had behaved towards ourselves and others. If we are not prepared to deconstruct ourselves in order to better understanding him,  then any change will be based on non-solid foundations.
This is often the case when we make hasty decisions in order to find a solution to a problem and, thus, stop to understand that there is a problem, the reasons why it exists and what could be the ways to effectively resolve it.

In the above example with the illness, a quick and easy solution could be the intake of drugs without making any change in diet and various other stressors that may affect the overall health of the individual. Therefore, restoring health will be partial, if at all successful.

This could also be the viewpoint of the results of the European elections, particularly of Greece.
Of course we are talking about a deeply complex subject, but for me the parameters for exploring it are the same. 
Europe and Greece in particular, by encountering and being part of the economic crisis and its consequences, was called upon to reconsider the foundations and values on which it leads its life.
It is like waking up in the morning with a serious cold.

There are systemic problems both at European level and at the level of the countries where solutions were sought and created that do not consider and solve the problems effectively, but provide a temporary relief, as the aspirin in the cold, whose real cause was that the person was not warm enough the previous day.

Any thorough analysis and understanding of a problem, leads at least to some solutions and some lessons.  My understanding of the Greek results (perhaps for the whole of Europe) is that people are quickly and easily looking for someone who will promise them hope, solution, relief and a better future. They vote, that is, with the sentiment, with the raw emotion a person has just before he drowns, grabbing the first, seemingly strong hand that is found in front of him in order to be saved.

This moment of 'despair' for me hides something more problematic, the transfer of responsibility.
It is easier for a society to vote for a man with special needs than to take care of his needs in the every day  life. 
It's easier to punish someone as a liar, when people are lying every day without consequences.
It is easier to ask for a political honesty and credibility when the same people had been having bad relations with those values for years.
It's easier to trust someone we looks and behaves like oneself someone rather than someone who is a little different and somehow provokes us to change.

It is almost impossible to expect different results when we continue to do the same thing.

With Love,
Panos